Free How to Look Happy by Stacey Wiedower

my head again. But Brad Pepper is still talking to me.
    “Everybody is talking about it,” he says, and I shudder to think who “everybody” is. Right now it feels like every stinking person I’ve ever met in my life. “We have a pool going on at my office. I’ve got ten down that Candace is screwing him.”
    I thank my lucky stars that I have an honest answer to his question and that it’s, “I don’t know.” Candace and I haven’t talked about that little episode at Brewster’s mansion since it happened, and apart from Candace trying to make me her lapdog on the project, I haven’t touched Brewster’s file since that night.
    “What do you mean, you don’t know?” Brad’s face twists into a smirk beneath his neatly trimmed lumber-sexual beard. “You’re the one who started the rumor.”
    “I mean, I really and truly don’t know,” I say. “Don’t you know that you can’t believe everything you read on the internet?”
    He gives me another look, basically one that makes it clear he thinks I’m off my meds.
    “Whatever.” He leans an arm on the mantel, as if he’s settling in for a while. “Do you know if you guys are bidding in on the Midtown Bike project?”
    I breathe a surreptitious sigh of relief that we’ve moved past the gossip and on to something solid. “You mean the Marc Rasmutin condo-conversion project? No, I don’t think we’re in on that,” I say. “I’ve been too slammed, and Midtown renos are usually my forte. Rachael’s been busy with the new Methodist clinic, and I haven’t heard anybody else talk about it around the office.”
    “Talk about what? Candace and Brewster?”
    A new voice pops into our conversation, and my head swivels around to my left. “Quinn!” I shoot her a dirty look for the Candace comment, and she gives me a toothy smile. Of all the people from work I could run into tonight, Quinn is second only to Candace herself as least preferable.
    That’s not because I don’t like her—it’s more that I know she’s about to embarrass me. Like, really, really embarrass me.
    She plops down into one of the two chairs facing Carrie’s and mine, which were vacated several minutes ago by two law students, judging from the conversation we couldn’t help but overhear.
    My choice for tonight’s hangout no longer seems so appealing. Greencork is a perfect spot for conversation, with good lighting and no place to hide. I should have picked Celtic Crossing, a pub just around the corner. It’s always smoky and filled with barely legal college kids, which is why we hardly ever go there, but it’s also full of dark corners, and the music is loud. A great place to disappear.
    “I was just asking Jen about that,” Brad says, his voice peppier than it was after I tried to shut him down. “Do tell.” He folds his lanky frame into the fourth slipper chair. I glance hopefully at his wife to see if she looks annoyed at being abandoned, but she’s deep in conversation with a petite, redheaded woman who’s standing beside their table. As I watch, the woman drags out the second chair and sits down, talking animatedly.
    I scowl.
    “Well, Jen here is being all quiet about it—funny, since she’s the one who announced it to the freaking world—” She cuts herself off and glances at me, but the look on my face does nothing to shut her up. “So I’ll tell you my theory.” She leans deeper into our little circle.
    “I think Candace is jealous that Brewster hired Jen instead of her, and so she used her most persuasive technique to nose in on the project.”
    Brad looks appropriately scandalized, but I can see the glint of glee behind his expression.
    “Quinn,” I exclaim, but I can’t find the right words to refute her accusation. She is right, after all. I’m still fighting for words when Brad interrupts.
    “That woman is dangerous,” he says, shaking his head, and it’s my turn to look scandalized.
    “What do you mean?” I ask. In my six years working